Published by: Julia Bolotova<>
10 Mar 2025 @ 17:58 UTC

Leading European steelmaker ArcelorMittal plans to carry out maintenance operations on major steelmaking equipment in France, with market sources expecting an additional boost to flat steel prices as a consequence, Fastmarkets heard on Monday March 10.

The company plans to invest more than €270 million ($293 million) in its two primary steel production plants in France, at Dunkirk and Fos-sur-Mer, the company said in a statement seen by Fastmarkets.
The lion’s share of this investment, €254 million, will be at ArcelorMittal’s Dunkirk site. Major works will be carried out in the second quarter of 2025 on an iron ore sintering line, on blast furnace (BF) No4 and at one of the steel mill’s converters. During this time, BF4 will be idled for 90 days, but BF3 will remain operational.
There are three BFs at the Dunkirk site with combined capacity for about 6.9 million tonnes per year of pig iron. Only BFs Nos 3 and 4 have been operational recently, however. BF2, with capacity for 1.4 million tpy of pig iron, has been idled since June 2022, Fastmarkets understands. The site can produce 4.6 million tpy of hot-rolled coil.
Logistics and supplies have been anticipated in order to limit the effect on downstream production facilities and to ensure continuity of service for customers, the company statement read.
At ArcelorMittal’s Fos-sur-Mer site, the first phase of work on BF1 was about to get under way, the company said. The cost was estimated at €18.3 million to extend the life of this production unit. BF1 was scheduled for a restart no earlier than the first half of 2026. In the meantime, BF2 will remain operational.
BF1 at Fos-sur-Mer has been idled since the third quarter of 2023.
ArcelorMittal Fos-sur-Mer has two BFs with total capacity for about 5 million tpy of pig iron, market sources said. The site produces hot-rolled and cold-rolled coil.
The company gave no comment at the time of publication on the potential production losses that would result from the idling of the Dunkirk BFs.
Industry sources said that this unexpected move by a market leader would give an additional boost to hot-rolled coil prices in Europe.
The HRC price rebound we see now is mainly driven by the circumstances around [trade] safeguard [measures] and restocking, not by real demand. News of such a major interruption at ArcelorMittal will probably push [flat steel] prices higher, a buyer source said.
There is no [HRC] shortage yet, the same source added, but if HRC import quotas are cut significantly under new [European Union] safeguards, and if Arcelor[Mittal] idles one big furnace in France, I’m sure the market will feel the effects.
Fastmarkets calculated its daily steel hot-rolled coil index, domestic, exw Northern Europe, at €631.88 per tonne on Monday, up by €0.50 per tonne from €631.38 per tonne on Friday.
The Northern European index was up by €3.96 per tonne week on week and by €33.13 per tonne month on month.